Roach
Ruminations
Shuvo
Hussain
Where
there's one in the open there are countless more hiding.
Nothing you can do will ever get rid of them. You will
die, and they'll be here.
It
might be a hopeless situation, but I am not one to be
victimised by fear. I admit, sometimes when I see a cockroach,
I scream like a woman. Not that there's anything wrong
with screaming like a girl. Being not a girl, it's just
unnatural for me.
Like
it's unnatural to fear things that don't trigger the innate
human aversion to death. Snakes? Spiders? Yes. Heights?
Sure. Small scurrying insects?
An
uncle told me that this fear is symbolic of something.
I need to figure out what it represents, face it, the
cockroach and blah blah blah. He actually said that I
should get rid of it SO THAT IT CAN BE REPLACED WITH ANOTHER.
While that might not sound logical, correct, relevant
or whatever, he said it and I thought about it and it
fits well into this rumination of cockroaches.
I
can afford to have a fear of cockroaches. It could be
much worse. I like to make sure that dates are really
dates before I eat them, but I don't become paralyzed
at the thought of addressing a crowd. I don't have to
wonder if I'll be able to find food come next mealtime.
I will remain a sheltered someone with an insignificant
fear.
So,
I spent some time trying to get to the root of this fear,
which turns out, is more like a dislike. It can't be a
phobia. I don't hop up on tables or dash out of the room
when I see one. I don't mind them at all, really. They
are like a quiet family member I don't get along with.
We share the same living space, but we stay out of each
other's way. And they always leave the room whenever I
come in.
But
they are more intrusive than a family member could ever
be. They go everywhere. So, maybe it's a sanitary issue
that makes me dislike cockroaches. I think it's safe to
say that they are quite dirty. And I know when I see a
cockroach in a room, it could have been anywhere in the
room. It could have been getting its dirty feet over everything,
wiping its cockroach butt on all my stuff.
The
'scaredy cat' in me is still uncomfortable when he sees
a cockroach. Sometimes I can't help but be 'creeped out'.
I don't know what it is, their groping antennae, their
mysteriously repulsive underside, but everything I touch
-- everything that touches me -- turns into a cockroach.
The string hanging from my clothing. The random hair tickling
my neck. The toothbrush in my hands…
Sometimes
I must give death to the cockroach.
But I saw the glory of cockroaches one day while I watched
a cockroach flee. It clambered into the crevice of a door
and waited there until well after I lost patience. That
is determination, and that is beautiful. They are primed
to do what they have to, and I have to fight to turn off
the television when I know I have something better to
do.
That
is why I don't like them. I am jealous of their amazing
tenacity. They are practically machines when it comes
to goal orientation. I don't like to go outside when it's
rainy. They will eat decaying matter.
But
prosperity isn't all that grand and enviable. They are
ruthless. Dishonest. They have no conscience, moral rules,
anything other than to fulfill that purpose. I can't do
that. Neither would I want to. Where's the love? There's
no compassion.
I
will never lend money to a cockroach.
I apologise in being fickle about cockroaches, it's just
this soft, over-thinking un-cockroach sensibility that
I need to disown.
Let's review. I am doomed like the dinosaurs. When we
humans kill ourselves and lay waste to the Earth on which
we live, the cockroach will crawl out from under the incinerated
heap of trash that we will leave behind. And it will be
happy, if in fact they can feel such an emotion.
The
cockroach, then. Role model. Inspiration. I shouldn't
fear the cockroach. I need to embrace the cockroach.
I need to be the cockroach.